Professor provides first documentation of chemical interaction

In a journal article currently under review by the Journal of the American Chemical Society, Mark Ams, assistant professor of chemistry, explains an interaction that has never been documented before. The interaction demonstrates the strength of a chemical interaction that happens with molecules containing a fluorine group above a ring structure, which is six carbons attached to each other.

Ams’ lab is currently studying the weak interactions that occur within one molecule. In the structure they use, called a torsion balance system, a long chain of carbons in the molecule fold in such a way that the end of the end is able to fold over the ring structure.

This torsion balance system is required to isolate the specific molecular force that they wish to study, a force that is so weak it is typically not able to be measured, according to Rosey Sheridan, ’15, who has worked on this project.